Could Python supplant Java?

[Bernhard Herzog]

"James J. Besemer" <jb at cascade-sys.com> writes:

> Casts are NOT automatically generated for pointers, so the following
> code WILL exhibit the expected Polymorphism without virtual functions
> (classes A and B as above):
> 
>     void foo( A* arg ){
>         arg.x;
>         arg.bar();        // calls A or B depending on type of arg
>     }
> 
>     A a; B b;
> 
>     foo( &a );    // foo will call A.bar()
>     foo( &b );    // foo will call B.bar()

No, foo(&b) will call A::bar unless bar is virtual.

[...]
> Paul Foley wrote:
> 
> > And just what do you think your C++ vtable lookup is?
> 
> > You've failed to demonstrate that.  You had to resort to late binding,
> > via `virtual', to get polymorphism in C++
[...]
> "Early binding" generally means resolved at or before link time. 

However, which virtual method bar is called in a function like this

void foo(A * a)
{
    a->bar();
}

Is *not* determined at link time.

   Bernhard

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